


awakenings

by attheborder



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: 6000 Years of Love (Good Omens), Angst and Fluff and Smut, Flawed Internal Schemas, Love Confessions, M/M, Pining, the heart playing tricks on itself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:13:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24064882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/attheborder/pseuds/attheborder
Summary: Aziraphale knows it in Eden.He watches the demon, Crawly, sprawled loose-limbed underneath the boughs of an eternally blooming magnolia, lazily swatting at the plump bees that buzz around his head, and knows he is in love with him.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 74
Kudos: 441





	awakenings

_"But there can often be a lot of 'thinking you love someone' before the loving truly begins."  
_ _— The Man In The Red Coat_ by Julian Barnes

_"Now I am superlatively, actually awake."  
_— The amnesiac conductor Clive Wearing

  
  
  


Aziraphale knows it in Eden.

He watches the demon, Crawly, sprawled loose-limbed underneath the boughs of an eternally blooming magnolia, lazily swatting at the plump bees that buzz around his head, and knows he is in love with him. 

On this plane, in this body, Aziraphale is subject to all the forces the Almighty has created. Gravity, yes. Electromagnetism, the strong and weak nuclear. And, it seems— love as well.

Adam and Eve certainly didn’t take long to get down to it, after all. Aziraphale, having observed the Garden and its inhabitants closely, knows of no possible love other than the kind that blossoms at first light, and does not wither ever after, even as the sun falls below the horizon. That is the only reference he has to compare this feeling inside him to, the sensation that throbs deep within him when he lets his eyes linger on Crawly, on the dark pool of him beneath the tree.

“I love you,” he whispers, so softly not even the bees can hear, just to know how it feels. 

  
  


***

On the Ark, Aziraphale thinks of how foolish he was, to believe that he’d loved Crawly after just a few scant days in a garden, hardly even speaking to each other. Longing gazes and yearning sighs does not a true love make. 

He hadn’t known then, not really, the true appeal of an argument that went on long after nightfall, ideas and perspectives finding purchase before being wrestled triumphantly to the rhetorical floor. He hadn’t known all the different tones of Crowley’s voice, the demon’s magical ability to parrot and mimic, to mock and decry, to leave Aziraphale wheezing with laughter one moment and incandescent with offense the next. 

But now that he does, now and only now— can he believe himself to finally, fully be in love with Crowley. 

***

In Rome, Aziraphale cannot countenance his own sheer idiocy.

How could he have possibly loved Crowley, when they’d never shared a meal together? It was a childish infatuation, before this moment, before he’d ever seen food make its way past those full lips, before he’d watched that tanned throat bob as it drank down a dark wine. 

Crowley’s hair is shorter, now, too, and Aziraphale finds it almost laughable he’d thought what he felt for this demon was _love,_ when only on this day has he first glimpsed the pale nape of Crowley’s neck, the full uncurtained juncture of his ear and jaw. 

They order course after course, jug after jug. Aziraphale does not want the night to end. He doesn't want it to slip away, this moment of knowing that for the first time in nearly four thousand years, he really and truly is in love. 

***

It is the fourteenth century, and Aziraphale has not seen Crowley in ninety-six years. Every season that passes without sight of him, in this monastery high on a mountainside, hurts deeper than the last. 

It was pure folly to have thought himself in love, in those times he could go centuries without meeting Crowley, and not have each separated year be a brand new wound upon his heart. 

Love is solely proven by pain in its absence, surely. So only now, assigned to this most sacred of places, where Crowley could not tread even if he wished, is Aziraphale absolutely positive he knows for the first time what it actually means to love.

  
  


***

London burns, and Aziraphale gathers his precious books, his artifacts and keepsakes, into a bag that rightfully should not be able to fit them all, and escapes outside the city walls. 

There is a familiar dark shape waiting for him there, lingering in the shadow of Aldgate. Aziraphale can smell the telltale scent of Hell on Crowley, the acrid stench of a bad deed done well clinging to his smoke-stained skin. 

He doesn’t need to ask where Crowley has been. His own side has warned him, in many recent holy missives, about increased activity from Below during these tumultuous times of plagues, wars, dissidence. He knows well that Crowley had something to do with the flames now consuming the city; to ask for details would be to invite further pain. So instead they exchange mumbled pleasantries, avoiding each others’ gazes, but not willing to separate, not just yet. 

“A pity,” Aziraphale is saying. “All those homes, and oh— St. Paul’s! That interior was simply divine…” 

Crowley grimaces, ash-faced, and shrugs. “I wouldn’t know.” 

“Oh. Oh, yes, of course.” 

Silhouetted against the smoke, Crowley is wicked, and foul, and demonic, and Aziraphale loves him. Oh, he does, he does, he does. 

Only real love could withstand such conditions, such determined attempts to exterminate it. Whatever Aziraphale felt before this awful day, it was untested and as such untrue. 

It is only now, faced with such inarguable evidence of Crowley’s nature, and feeling a tide of affection rise within him nonetheless, feeling the urge to gather the demon into his arms and hold him there, whisper words of forgiveness and comfort, does Aziraphale know that he is finally in love at last. 

***

It happens again, and again. Aziraphale curses his own stupidity, as each and every time his past self is proven idiotic, infantile, naive, simply misled. His heart bears a succession of false claimants to the crown of love, each overthrown in turn. 

He did not truly love Crowley until Paris, when the demon snatched him from underneath the hanging blade of Mme Guillotine, for love is only love when it surprises, amazes, does the impossible.

He did not truly love Crowley until St. James Park, when he refused to provide him with the means to his own destruction, because love is not love if it bends to every harmful whim, accepts every poor decision without question.

He did not truly love Crowley until the bombs fell on St. Mildred’s, because in that moment he knew Crowley must love him as well, and love is only love when it travels both ways, amplified by actions on both ends, miracles done in the maintenance of it. 

He did not truly love Crowley until he handed over a thermos full of holy water, because love is not love unless it is trusting, rather than rigid and unforgiving.

He did not truly love Crowley until they shook hands in the back room of his darkened bookshop, promising to save the world together, for love can only really be love when it is committed to, promised, sealed with a touch. 

***

“I love you,” Aziraphale says, between kisses to Crowley’s cheeks, his throat, the corners of his lovely mouth, here in the darkness of the demon’s flat on the night after the end of the world. “Crowley, I love you.” 

“How long?” gasps Crowley. “How long have you loved me?” 

“I— if you must know, I don’t believe I ever have before, not until this moment. Not really.” 

“You can’t be serious. You’re lying, you’ve loved me longer than that—”

“A childish crush. A mere obsession. Darling, I swear, I never truly loved you before now!“ 

“That’s not true. You’re being _ridiculous.”_

Aziraphale finds it in himself to be primly offended, even as Crowley’s fingers find the buttons of his shirt, open them, and press into Aziraphale’s skin, shockingly cool as they travel up his chest, exploring him, claiming him. 

“I’m _not!”_

“You are, though. You wanna know how I know? That you’re wrong? I’ve watched you. I’ve _known_ you, better than anyone. That— that damn look in your eyes, it hasn’t changed in six thousand years, no matter what you think. I’d’ve noticed if it had, believe me. You’ve loved me from the very start, angel. From the beginning.” 

This revelation does not square with Aziraphale’s understanding. It does not slot neatly into his narrative. “But I _know,”_ he insists. “Everything before now, before this moment— it was nothing. It was all in my head. But I feel it now _everywhere,_ my dear.” 

“I can tell,” Crowley smirks, his hand now traveling downwards. The smirk turns into a smile as he finds purchase, and Aziraphale gasps, shudders, clutches Crowley tighter. 

“I guess it doesn’t matter,” Crowley goes on, “seeing as we’re here now, after all.” 

“Oh, but it _does!_ Love is not love unless it is spoken aloud, and only now am I speaking it, so only _now_ do I truly love you, Crowley—” 

“If I let you believe that you’re right,” Crowley retorts, and Aziraphale remembers their friendly sparring as the Ark traversed those many waters, remembers how naively he'd thought he'd known love then, “will you keep saying it?” 

“Saying—” 

“That you love me.” 

“Clearly, you’ve— _ah!—_ known this whole time,” Aziraphale says, still managing petulance even as Crowley’s swift touch between his legs increases in speed, sending shocks of sensation rocketing upwards, “so why do you need me to prattle on?” 

There is silence, for a few moments, just the sound of breathing from the both of them, coming heavier now, the sound of fabric rustling between them, and the sound of skin on skin, hot and human. 

And then Crowley speaks, right into Aziraphale’s ear, in a voice so low, so close, it makes Aziraphale shake with the dearness of it, or maybe that’s just the rising tide of pleasure inside him— 

“Let me count the ways. Because you clearly want to. Because it's the most beautiful thing I’ve heard. Because really, I deserve to be told, after all this time. Because— even though I’ve known, all along, doesn’t mean I ever really let myself believe. And because I love you, too.” 

Aziraphale falls apart, then, beneath the weight of Crowley’s affection, physical and otherwise, cresting over into ecstasy, unlike anything he’s known, from his own touch or that of others. 

“I take it back,” he gasps, winded, “everything I said before, _now_ I love you, now I _really_ love you, Crowley—” 

And he goes on, until Crowley throws his head back in joy, lets out one of those pure, gleeful laughs, and cuts him off with another kiss. 

***

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> if you want to be really really sad, go read [this incredible piece about Clive Wearing](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/09/24/the-abyss) by one of my favorite writers of all time, the late Dr. Oliver Sacks. 
> 
> if you don't want to be sad, just read this fic again i guess :') 
> 
> (the title is a nod to another Sacks book, _Awakenings_ , which is also very good.) 
> 
> i'm on [tumblr](http://areyougonnabe.tumblr.com) and [twitter!](http://twitter.com/areyougonnabe)


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